Fire from a Black Opal is the fourth of this series of Stories and Sketches. It contains the collections, Charity, A Hatchment and Brought Forward, published between 1912 and 1916, immediately prior to and during the First World War. Cunninghame Graham was by now in his sixties, yet many of the stories demonstrate his amazing powers of recall for the experiences and feelings of his youth. Equally the later stories reveal a close empathy with the terrible demands that the war was making on people of different nations. Honour and virtue do not of necessity take with them charity; neither can base estate nor any adverse circumstance of life stifle it in the hearts of those, to whom it comes, just as the fire shines out from a black opal, almost without their ken. Charity, Preface. Alan MacGillivray is a specialist in Scottish Literature, who has lectured at the University of Strathclyde, Glasgow, and is a former President of the Association for Scottish Literary Studies. John C. McIntyre taught Spanish Language and Latin American Literature at the University of Strathclyde, Glasgow. He holds a postgraduate Diploma in Scottish Literature. James N. Alison is a retired HM Inspector of Schools with specialist interests in Scottish literature, children's books and landscapes.